Pages

19 January 2012

January Ancestors

For the sake of brief entries, I am
not footnoting the facts in this ongoing memorial. Sources have been
noted either in other blog posts or in my family history books.

20 January
1867:John
Dougall, my emigrant ancestor from West Calder, Midlothian, Scotland,
died on this day at the age of 86. Presumably he died at his farm
located at Beech Ridge, just outside St. Andrews East, Argenteuil County, Quebec, now
known as St-André
Est. When he was 51 years old John came to Canada with his wife and
children, two years after his oldest son had arrived. He is
buried at St. Andrews East Protestant Cemetery.
Had he lived another six months, he would have witnessed Canadian
Confederation.

25 January
[Julian calendar] 1881:
Otto Freibergs of Ķonēni
Farm on the Marzingshof (Latvian: Mārciņmuiža)
estate, Riga District, Latvia, married Ilse Indricksons of the
Wattram (Latvian: Vatrāne)
estate, same district, in the Lutheran church at Suntaži,
same district. They lived their married life at Ķonēni;
Otto carried on the family farm where his father Ansis had been
located since the 1850s. Otto was able to purchase the land in 1878
after modest reforms in Latvia allowed peasants to acquire and own
land. By the turn of the twentieth century, he had become a local
parish official and spokesman for further reforms. Otto and Ilse had
six children, of whom four lived to adulthood.

27 January
1790: Marion Hastie was
born, daughter of John Hastie and Margaret Brown of Heads Farm,
Whitburn, Linlithgowshire. A baptism has not been found for Marion in
relevant parish registers although most of her siblings were recorded
at Whitburn. Evidence for her date of birth comes from two sources I
have never seen. Her husband's family bible recorded her birth but
the bible passed to the family of her youngest daughter, its
whereabouts unknown now. Along the way, a transcript was made of the
family dates it contained. When Marion was 14 years old, she
embroidered a sampler with birth dates for herself and all her
siblings—they concurred with the parish register entries when
available.

Update:
Missed these, first time around:

31 January
1895 Ann (“Nancy”) Fraser died at St. Andrews East. Nancy’s
burial site, like that of her husband John Fraser, is not marked. The
Renfrew Mercury of 8 February
1895reported:

“Died
Jan. 31, St. Andrews River Rouge, Que., Nancy Fraser, widow of the
late John Fraser, and sister-in-law of the late Dr. Wm Fraser,
Montreal, and mother of Mrs. P. Dougall, Renfrew, aged 85 years.”

January
1832 Ann (“Nancy”)
Fraser married blacksmith John Fraser, both of St. Andrews East,
Lower Canada, at the time. Their marriage bond was executed across
the river in Longeuil township, Prescott County, Upper Canada, on 5
January 1832. The bondsmen were two men called James McIntosh, one a
tailor and the other addressed as “Esq.” The witness was
Alexander Fraser, probably Nancy’s eldest half-brother. The
marriage probably took place the same day or soon after; an actual
church record eludes me. A Presbyterian Church opened in 1832 at
L’Orignal, the seat of Prescott County, and could have been the
venue; it seems likely a clergyman was already residing in the town.
I have not been able to discover where its records are now. The
church itself (and its Scottish congregation) are long gone. Nancy,
of an Inverness-shire family, and John, of a Perthshire family, were
two of my great-great-grandparents.